If I learned anything from Unreal Tournament, it's that two automatic pistols are better than one, and holding them sideways makes them fire faster. It's two popular handgun fallacies in one!

Unreal Tournament and the Unreal series in general have produced some pretty amazing weapons with equally impressive alternate firing modes. Some of my personal favorites include the Flak Cannon, with its joyous bouncing shrapnel, and the ASMD Shock Rifle, with an alt-fire mode that produced a Shock Core, that could be fired upon to create an explosion of energy.

For all of the amazing alt-fire modes the series has produced, the Enforcer automatic pistol's secondary firing mode always seemed a bit off.

Hitting the right mouse button turned the gun sideways, gangsta-style. This is a completely silly way to hold a pistol that has almost no benefit in real life, outside of certain tactical situations. Police holding riot shields, for example, will sometimes hold a firearm sideways because tilting and lifting the gun can make the sight easier to see. It doesn't make the gun fire faster, which is what happens in Unreal Tournament.

Perhaps it's just how future weapons work. There's some sort of gyroscope inside the gun that works better when the weapon is sideways, perhaps? Couldn't the weapon manufacturer tilt things around so it fired faster upright instead? It's certainly not a matter of squeezing the trigger faster, since it is an automatic weapon.

It's even more entertaining when you pick up an additional Enforcer off the corpse of a fallen enemy. Dual wielding handguns is a common occurrence in shooter video games and Hong Kong action movies, but in real life all firing a weapon in both hands generally does is make a lot of noise. Normally you'd be better off firing a single weapon using a two-handed grip, which allows for more shots fired with greater accuracy. Plus, handguns have sights for a reason, and lining up the sights on two guns in two hands with only two eyes is next to impossible.

So you can probably understand why I giggle when I see those two guns turned sideways.

Epic balanced out the increased rate of fire with decreased accuracy, so on average, holding the pistol sideways isn't much better than holding it upright, except in circumstances where your opponent is extremely close. The only reason I'm doing so well in the clip is because I'm battling easy bots instead of wily humans.

So why use the Enforcer's alt-fire mode at all? The same reason John Woo had Chow Yun Fat flying through the air firing two pistols through a cloud of doves every chance he could get. It's just plain cool.